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Mistress Eva is one of the most in-demand Mistresses in the BDSM world. She writes about the large increase in sign-ups to her BDSM training website during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Source: Thedailybeast.com

As quarantines went into place around the world due to the novel coronavirus pandemic, signups on my BDSM training website surged. The first wave came when China went into lockdown in January, but an even larger one arrived when major cities in the U.S. started shutting down.

The world of BDSM, fetishes, and power dynamics are a comfort for many in the best of times. So it isn’t surprising to see people moving toward websites and services such as mine in times where they seek even greater levels of reassurance, understanding, and intimacy.

When news of COVID-19 first hit me I reacted like many of us may have: I thought about my family and my personal safety. I felt an uneasy uncertainty about what was to come. But as my Dominatrix side kicked in, my fetishes for latex hoods, imprisoning others, and mummification (where you literally wrap someone up in different materials like an Egyptian mummy) started to titillate and perhaps distract my mind.

BDSM is made up of many parts that include specific fetishes, such as feet or bondage, and power dynamics like those between a Dominant and submissive. These interests and needs can be considered taboo, and identifying with them tends to already isolate you from everyday society. So when you do find people who accept and appreciate your desires it can lead to heightened levels of shared honesty, understanding, and intimacy. It can create a bond and provide a comforting space where supposed extremes of personality are treasured and maybe even relished within.

Then there are the roles and the comfort that they can provide in and of themselves. Be it Mommy-baby, Mistress-slave or Dominant-submissive—when you choose to subscribe to a specific role it can lead to a sense of liberation. It can offer a chance to leave everyday life behind and step into the surrender that being a “baby” may allow or to embody a sense of control that the role of “Mistress” may require.

In these times, I am seeing my pool of submissives move a little more toward their “baby” sides—embodying a sense of helplessness and rolling around in it. Now, as someone who identifies as a Dominant and Mistress, I attract personalities who seek to offer their vulnerability to me regardless. But what I have seen since quarantines and lockdowns arrived is that a slightly higher need for attention, reassurance, and a sense of protection has come with it. Those who are new to me are spending a lot of time logged in to my BDSM training site, and the dedicated ways that they are completing their courses and tasks is endearing. But among those who I’ve known for longer and on a deeper level, I see how their usual desires have acquired an added intensity, and their need for my support in the events of their lives is elevated. Their particular kinks—be it for latex, anal play, or chastity—haven’t shifted but they’ve had to become more virtually-administered, and I predict that 2021 is going to be quite an exhaustingly pleasurable year for us.

“Among those who I’ve known for longer and on a deeper level, I see how their usual desires have acquired an added intensity, and their need for my support in the events of their lives is elevated.”

Pre-coronavirus I would travel to meet with my inner circle of slaves and submissives each month and we would share two or three days together in cities around the world. We would visit fetish shops, attend BDSM events, and meet up with my network of Dominatrices. I hung on to this routine for as long as I could. But three weeks ago, on my way to such a trip in London, I had to turn around at Singapore’s Changi Airport and return to Bali. They were closing the Indonesian borders to U.K. arrivals and I didn’t want to be barred from where I have come to consider home. But with this I had to leave a slave of mine on their own, already in London, and perched right on the cusp of lockdown. My slave was also there for a work trip, but regardless of that distraction their tone shifted, and despite my efforts for more frequent interaction there was a hint of panic in his voice.

Now this slave is back in their home country—albeit in quarantine, and thankfully his tone has quietened. But that edge and panic soon began to show itself among all of my submissives as my other travel plans came to a standstill and the prospect of us meeting up went on an indefinite hold. My submissives began to reach out through messages with greater frequency, and as the reality of being grounded in Bali took hold I began to devise a strategy for us. I have now started a roster of weekly or fortnightly video calls where we mostly talk about our lives and families, we make plans for once these times are settled, sometimes we swap business crisis-management ideas, and occasionally we play to our kinks. In between these calls I assign them tasks to enliven their quarantines and remind them of us: business shirts and latex chaps during Zoom meetings, YouTube-ing various handwashing techniques, and one slave and I are even about to embark on an academic online course together. 

With that being said, I don’t feel too much has changed in our relationships. There may be an extra sense of the unknown but my role as our leader and them as those under my care continues. When these times pass and borders re-open our routines will shift again, perhaps even back to what it was before. I may go back to traveling with my submissives every month, and we may even find ourselves at fetish events among their thousands of attendees. Some may have acquired new kinks for being washed thoroughly or may be embracing a newfound desire for spit as edgeplay.

The initial lockdown may have taken hold of many of us, inspiring an influx of interest in my BDSM training site and a panic among my nearest and dearest. But what has shown itself so far is that the need for connection, intimacy, reassurance, and stability prevails, as always—and BDSM and the nature of the power dynamic that I practice as a Mistress over my submissives seems to provide for this. The times simply make it more obvious.